New Hubstar Workplace Event Reveals What Keeps Workplace Leaders Up At Night

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06 July 2026

A virtual seminar for 300 workplace leaders, hosted by workplace solutions provider HubStar, has highlighted the top five conundrums that are keeping workplace leaders awake at night. 

Joe Harris, HubStar’s Director of Business Development, explained: “We wanted to ask the attendees: What are the things that are most on your mind? … What are the biggest challenges you're grappling with? … What's keeping you up at night?”.

The number one concern that has workplace leaders counting sheep at night is the office attendance debate over “mandates versus magnets” – especially when workplace leaders have to enforce return-to-office mandates they don’t agree with. A poll of event attendees found that just under 60% preferred to give their teams and individual employees the flexibility to decide on their own office attendance.

The second conundrum causing sleepless nights is how to measure productivity and workplace experience when there are still no universally accepted metrics for this, or any means of distinguishing them from concepts like team performance. A poll of event attendees found that workplace flexibility tended to have the biggest impact on team performance.

The third issue that keeps workplace leaders awake at night is the challenge of cross-functional collaboration between Human Resources (HR) and Corporate Real Estate (CRE) teams. Collaboration structures are continuing to lag behind significant changes in job responsibilities. Only 11% of event attendees reported that their HR and CRE teams are highly aligned and working with shared goals.

The virtual seminar revealed that the fourth nightmare for workplace leaders is how to tailor the workplace experience when there are now four different generations of employees in the workplace (and soon to be five with Generation Alpha). Because each age-group has a different need from the office, attendees reported it is becoming harder to implement a hybrid work policy that fits all four.

The fifth challenge workplace leaders are grappling with is the impact of AI on workplace design and space allocation in offices. Just under half of the attendees reported that AI has created new workplace complications that are leading to changes in meeting and social spaces and privacy pods. For example, spoken interactions with AI are saving time and making some teams faster, but the sound is distracting for people in the spaces around them. Some organisations are responding by installing more privacy booths and adding soundproofing material around individual desks.

Picture: An image of the 'What Keeps 300 Workplace Leaders Up At Night' webinar guide.

Article written by Dave Mapps | Published 06 July 2026

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